Snapper 1 management plan

The SNA1 Strategy Group, including customary, recreational and commercial fishers, has worked together on a long-term strategy for the Snapper 1 Fishery, which stretches from the top of the North Island to Cape Runaway in the east.

SNA1 Strategy Group

The group, which was established by then Minister for Primary Industries, Nathan Guy, comprises representatives from customary, recreational and commercial fishing sectors.

There are also alternates and representatives from Fisheries New Zealand. Sir Ian Barker QC is the independent chair. The group provided a forum for sharing and discussing ideas and information, and through a series of meetings the group created a management plan to make improvements to the fishery and its management.

The formation of the group followed extensive consultation of management measures for the fishery in 2013. In response to the consultation – as well as new evidence which suggested the stock had increased but needed further rebuilding to reach target levels – a package of new measures was introduced.

As part of that a number of matters were identified as important to examine further. The Minister established the SNA1 Strategy Group to progress these conversations and develop a long term plan to improve the management of the SNA1 fishery.

Why we need a plan

SNA1 area

The fishery is important to a wide range of different people, many of whom want different things. No matter what our perspective, we all want to make sure there are enough fish in the water for current and future generations.

The group took this as their starting position. It decided that while there has been evidence of a substantial rebuild in the fishery, more needed to be done to build on those good foundations.

In order to ensure the fishery can best provide for the interests of all in the long term, the group considered there is a need for an increase in the biomass (amount of fish) of the snapper population to the level that will provide enough for future generations.

What's in the plan

A key component of the plan is the aim to increase the snapper population to reach a target stock level of 40% of the unfished biomass in 25 years. That means rebuilding the fishery to a state where it contains 40% of the amount of fish that would have been there in the absence of all types of fishing. To ensure progress, the plan specifies an intermediate target of 30% of the unfished biomass by 2025.

In order to reach these goals, the plan sets out a range of measures to:

reduce waste and improve productivity

improve monitoring and management of the SNA1 fishery

improve reporting and understanding of the snapper habitat and environment

implement and monitor the plan.

Some specific measures include:

undertaking a snapper tagging survey to estimate biomass, (begins in late 2016)

regularly monitoring and reviewing the status of the stock to ensure it is on track to reach the target and timeframe

educating all fishers on ways to avoid catching juvenile fish and increasing survival rates of released snapper